Howard Sends Message as Van Nuys East Romps

In the larger scope of Van Nuys East’s 17-4 American Legion victory against Van Nuys South on Wednesday at Grant High, East first baseman Rusty Howard’s contribution of three hits and four runs batted in mattered little.

But to Howard, who played with most of the South players at Grant, it was critical.

“I wanted to show these guys what I had,” Howard said. “This is exactly what I wanted to happen.”

Howard’s two-run home run gave East a 14-4 lead in the fifth, providing the necessary margin for the game to be called because of the mercy rule after South batted. Those five innings took a mere 2 hours 41 minutes.

East (17-1) has won 10 in a row. South (12-7) needed the victory more, though, because it is fighting for a wild-card berth in the District 20 playoffs, which begin Tuesday.

South’s fortunes took a turn south several days ago. Mike Weiss (7-0), the team’s ace, traveled with his father to the major league All-Star game in Baltimore. Without Weiss, Coach Alan Amitin prepared to use as many as six pitchers to endure Wednesday’s game.

He only needed five.

Amitin, who was ejected in the third inning for arguing balls and strikes, started Dave Forst (0-1). Forst allowed five runs in two innings. Shawn Smith allowed six more in two-thirds of an inning. Justin Salazar managed to pitch a scoreless 1 1/3 innings, but Victor Rose surrendered six runs while recording only one out. Rudy Velasquez finished.

Jason Litt (3-0) earned the victory for East.